Bill Gates promoted the service

The chairman of Microsoft visited the biggest video game exhibition of the year to promote the idea of ​​"Playing the game everywhere", when gaming devices, mobile phones and computers are connected.

Gates introduced an ambitious and ambitious plan called "Live Anywhere", using the success of the Xbox Live service as a springboard to penetrate the market of more than 150 million users playing games on Windows computers. . That's not to mention more than 1 billion mobile phones are ready to play games.

Lifetime upgrade for "Live"

Microsoft is currently the leading online game service with Xbox Live, a service that allows players worldwide to compete directly with each other, download new games and chat chats. The same feature will be integrated into the upcoming Vista operating system.

" This is an opportunity to raise" Direct "to a new level. We will go from" live "(Live) to" Live anywhere ", Gates said.

The giant jumped into the video game hardware business business since 2001 with the early Xbox. However, the Xbox division exists and operates independently of the rest of the company, including Windows.

Gates's appearance at the Electronic Entertainment Exhibition, E3, this year, shows the growing importance of the global video game industry (worth nearly $ 30 billion) to Microsoft and the US. Operators are waiting for Windows Vista.

However, launching a very expensive new console (console) - the loss of the entertainment division and the Microsoft family amounted to 388 million USD in the last fiscal quarter, compared with the loss of 175 million. USD a year ago.

Back to "Live Anywhere". This service will allow users to confront, compete with each other in a certain number of games, regardless of whether they are sitting on a computer, Xbox or a mobile phone. In addition, it allows users to open new games on the Xbox and then play them on a mobile phone or computer.

Despite being slow to jump into the video game market, Microsoft still beat rival Sony when it launched the Xbox 360 console system last November, exactly one year ahead of Sony's PlayStation 3.

Where is the new generation game?

Even so, the price of this advantage is not cheap. Xbox production costs in the past quarter exploded when Microsoft increased Xbox output to market.

Sony officials are still optimistic and not flinched by Microsoft's early attack. Even the director of Sony's game department in the US also announced yesterday that " New generation games cannot be formed as long as Sony hasn't announced yet " (!)

" I think they were too bold to announce that the new generation game only came out with PS3, so remember that 10 million users voted for Xbox 360, " Microsoft countered.

Analysts say Sony - which accounts for nearly two-thirds of the global console market share - will face major challenges in the near future.

" Microsoft is an extremely formidable competitor. Sony needs to consider Microsoft seriously and carefully, " said Van Baker, Gartner's research vice president.

Also in this E3 exhibition, Microsoft released a short video clip of "Halo 3", the latest version of the popular game series "Halo". As planned, Halo 3 will be released in 2007.

Thien Y